EAST LANSING — When Dave Warner accepted the promotion from Michigan State quarterbacks coach to co-offensive coordinator and play caller, he had to know there would be some bumps in the road.

But he could have never imagined a season-opening game against Western Michigan would prove to be such a road block in the development of his offense.

Dropped passes, missed throws, uninspired running and even a holding penalty from an experienced lineman thwarted drives and put Warner in the uncomfortable position of calling plays with unfavorable down-and-distance against a Mid-American Conference school that Michigan State was supposed to blow out.

The Spartans' offense heads into Saturday's noon game against South Florida (TV: ESPNU) rudderless, with no identity and without the stability a starting quarterback often can provide.

Bulls first-year head coach Willie Taggart, who has enough problems of his own after getting walloped by FCS school McNeese State 52-21 in his opener, has taken note of Michigan State's offensive struggles.

"I think on offense they are trying to establish an identity of who they are going to be,'' Taggart said on Monday. "I think they have some talented guys and are really big up front, they want to run the football and they are trying to figure out what they are going to do at quarterback.

"They have two talented guys at the position who bring two totally different perspectives to the game, and they're using them both to help them create some offense.''

Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio wouldn't provide specifics of how Michigan State's offense should look this season on the Big Ten coaches teleconference on Tuesday, leaning on generalizations when asked.

"Our identity needs to be what it has always been, it's that we're going to play with great effort and great toughness and we're not going to flinch,'' he said. "Obviously we need to score points.''

Michigan State gave all four quarterbacks repetitions with the first team in Tuesday's practice, as Dantonio followed up on his preseason pledge to go to extremes to find the most productive answer under center.

"It''s just a continuation from last week,'' Warner said, asked to describe the QB situation. "The guy upstairs (Dantonio) addressed that yesterday, he'll continue to handle those situations.''

Warner was asked specifically about redshirt freshman quarterback Tyler O'Connor, who entered the season No. 3 on the depth chart, and whether O'Connor would play and how difficult it was to develop him with other quarterbacks sharing repetitions with the first team.

Michigan State co-offensive coordinator Dave Warner knows the Spartans' quarterbacks well, having served as their position coach before becoming a coordinator and running backs coach.MLive file photo

"Is it hard to develop him? Yeah it's hard to develop him, but that's our hope,'' he said. "That's the question we keep asking ourselves: You try to get a quarterback ready to play, it's harder to get two ready to play, how do you get a third ready to play?

"But that's what we're trying to do until we figure out exactly what direction we're going to go.''

O'Connor has yet to play in a game, as it was redshirt freshman Connor Cook getting the work behind starter Andrew Maxwell against the Broncos. Cook was 6-of-16 passing for 42 yards (two dropped passes) and rushed for 35 yards on four carries.

Both Maxwell and Cook were pulled twice in favor of the other.

Warner conceded that the quick hook Dantonio displayed could challenge the QBs and perhaps make them overly gun-shy of making mistakes.

"That's always as possibility but I think that's something that we're willing as a coaching staff to say, `You're going to be under pressure, anyway, as a quarterback, so you just need to handle it, '' Warner said. "With our quarterback situation, we felt we needed to go that way.''

Warner said the issue goes beyond the quarterbacks and into schemes, play calls and personnel. This, after an offseason of film review, planning and more than 30 practices -- a great deal of them with the quarterbacks live in scrimmage situations.

"(We're) just trying to figure out scheme-wise if we're doing the right things, which I think we are, and just getting guys in the right position,'' said Warner, the offensive representative at the Spartans' weekly Wednesday press briefing.

"We've talked long lengths about position moves that need to be made to get guys in the right positions to make plays.''

Warner said Lyles did play receiver and quarterback in high school before feigning ignorance on the potential position move and referring the question to Dantonio — who's not available to the media after Tuesday until after Saturday's game.

"We haven't stolen anyone,'' Warner said. "Coach Dantonio could talk about that one … I don't have any idea what you guys are talking about.

"We've messed around with a couple of guys, but we haven't come up with any answers yet.''

Warner blamed himself for not calling more deep passes, as only two balls thrown could be considered deep routes against Western Michigan.

"I could have taken a couple shots through play-calling downfield a little bit to provide opportunities,'' Warner said. "A great part of our passing game was underneath, supposedly high percentage throws, which didn't turn out to be, but we need to give our guys opportunities down the field to make plays.

"When things aren't clicking it's a little bit harder to make that call, but in retrospect, I should have thrown the ball downfield more and given the guys more chances.''

"(Fowler) didn't get his hands up, it was well-played defensively, if you look on the other side of the field Keith Mumphery had about 5 yards on his guy,'' Warner said, "obviously would have preferred the quarterback to take a shot there.''

"I think he was disappointed in some throws and some reads, but he's always a perfectionist, he's always looking to be better, that's how he's approached his week, he said `I'm going to be better,' '' Warner said. "I don't think his decision-making was poor, that's always a strength of his, but at the same time there's areas where he could have made better decisions and thrown the ball better, that's his focus this week.''

"The running back has to make a guy miss or run over a guy, that's what we talk about, that's part of the job, we can't block them all,'' Warner said. "Until we get them out of there with the threat of our pass game, they're gonna be there. They got to do their job from a running back standpoint.''